Facing a police deadline to move the 50 chickens and other animals he accumulated over several months on city property, the self-styled urban farmer has been advertising them at Craigslist, the popular online classified website, hoping to earn a little money back.

His three donkeys are available for $300 each, but, Toole notes, "They are a family and must stay together."

The five pigs run between $120 and $150 a piece. His 16 goats are in a similar price range.

Want chickens? Fifty of them can be yours for $10 a hen, with roosters costing $20.

"Everything must be sold, paid for and removed by Sunday, Feb 16!" reads Toole's ad. "Make your best offer, but don't delay!"

His 30 day deadline technically doesn't expire for several days. Toole was first ordered to unload his menagerie at the end of January. But, according to his Craigslist ad, he has agreed to sell any remaining animals to an unidentified rescue on Monday, making Sunday the last day they'll be available to other takers.

That rescue is actually Animal Nation out of Rye New York, confirmed Patrick Moore, who helps run the nonprofit and its rescue work in New York and in Fairfield County.

"We've been in negotiations with him for close to a month. He was trying to find somewhere to keep his animals and keep them his," Moore said Friday.

Moore said while usually Animal Nation does not buy animals, Toole had reiterated comments made last month to Hearst Connecticut Media that if he could not sell the animals he would slaughter them for food.

"He made it quite clear these animals had an economic value to him and as an animal welfare organization we don't want to see them slaughtered," Moore said. "We don't normally offer people money but this is a very different circumstance."

He said three donors came forward with an unspecified amount to pay Toole.

If Toole goes through with the sale to Animal Nation, the organization will arrive in Bridgeport and take the herd to in-state emergency shelters until all the necessary examinations and paperwork are completed.

"They will be placed in homes and farm sanctuaries," Moore said.

Toole is a self-described burnt-out bank executive from New York City who, after being told he couldn't raise chickens at his Bridgeport apartment with his girlfriend and two sons, was allowed by Mayor Bill Finch to bring them to excess land by the city's animal shelter with the goal of starting an experimental urban farm.

But state regulators said they were never told of the situation. After learning of Toole's farm in the fall from Hearst, the Department of Agriculture temporarily quarantined the site until it was brought up to code, and made several subsequent inspections over the winter.

Neither the state nor the Bridgeport police, who oversee the animal shelter, were happy with the situation. And last month the police told Toole to seek greener, non-city-owned pastures.

His threat to slaughter the animals aroused concerns among a variety of animal welfare groups, including the Connecticut branch of the Humane Society.

"It's just a very odd thing it got this big," Annie Hornish, the society's state director, said Friday of Toole's farm.

Finch's office had been refusing to comment on Toole's farm over the winter. But last month in a statement Andrew Nunn, the mayor's chief administrative officer, said: "Chris expanded too quickly and beyond what was discussed. He found himself in over his head. The police department made the right call."

A Department of Agriculture spokesman Friday said that agency continues to keep an eye on Toole.

"The department has been monitoring this situation and intends to follow the animals right to the border," said George Krivda. "Wherever we have jurisdiction, we'll exercise it."